Veteran Nollywood actress, Joke Silva, has told the story of how she discovered that the “father and mother” she was staying with at her tender age were not her parent, but that they adopted her.
The veteran actress revealed this during an interview on Funmi Iyanda’s Public Eye.
Silva, now 59, said she made the discovery when she was about 10 years old, adding that she was shattered when she found her adoption papers.
She said: “It is something that one is just getting to the point where one is just sharing it in the public arena.
“It is something I found out when I was much younger because mine was a secret adoption.
“When I mean secret, I mean it was legal because it was done through the Red Cross and all that, but it was not something that my parents discussed.
“My aunt wanted me to travel with her to Kenya and my mother was not around so she said: ‘Do you know where your passport is?’
“And I told her: ‘Yes. I know where my mother keeps all the important documents.’
“I go to this important suitcase that has all the document.
“I found my passport and also found my adoption certificate.
“I was about 10 or 11 years and it was a bit earth-shattering.
“It was tough.
“You know how you are, you are very sensitive as a child in the sense that there was just something in it because if it was something they wanted to discuss, they would have discussed it with me but there was just nobody to discuss it with.”
However, Silva said she did not inform her parents of the discovery and they did not also discuss it with her until years later.
She said she found it interesting that her mother found it easier to discuss the topic with her (Silva’s) son.
She told Iyanda: “Over the years, we got to a particular point where we were able to discuss it, especially me and my mother.
“We discussed it at some point.
“What was actually interesting is that she found it easier to discuss it with my older son than she did with me.
“When I found the document, I did not discuss it with them for a long time because I realised that there was just something instinctive in me that knew that if it was okay to discuss it, I would have been told about it.
“But my mum was not comfortable with talking about it so I did not bring it up.”
